Personal LibertyBob Livingston provides you with a conservative, Christian view on life. Helping you live free in an unfree world. Delivering news on improving you health, boosting your wealth, and protecting your civil liberties."

The government steals wealth subtly through inflation. The constant expansion of credit by the Federal Reserve creates artificial disparities based on political privilege and huge wealth. This expansion of credit is pure inflation. It’s simply counterfeiting on an unbelievable scale.

Of course, some people benefit and others don’t. Who do you think benefits? The elite, of course. The Federal Reserve was created by the elite for the elite.

But there is also a more overt form of theft underway. It also benefits a privileged few at the expense of the people. It is the theft of property.

According to John Locke, one of the central roles of government is to protect the individual’s property. But thanks to property taxes, governments are in the business of property confiscation.

A recent series in The Washington Post exposed the theft system in Washington, D.C., in which people are being kicked from their homes and seeing their possessions placed in the street over unpaid tax bills as low as $44.

The D.C. government abdicated its responsibility and enlisted private investors to help collect past-due property taxes. It morphed into a system in which predatory corporations turned small delinquencies in the hundreds of dollars into debts totaling in the thousands of dollars. The corporations then foreclosed on the properties when owners couldn’t pay.

Tax lien purchases have foreclosed on nearly 200 houses since 2005 and are now moving to confiscate as many as 1,200 more. Many of these homes have been owned by families for generations. One-third of them had liens of less than $1,000.

The tax sale is the first and last resort and the only way to compel property owners to pay their ransom, a D.C. tax official told The Post.

Once the home is foreclosed on, families are forced to fork over thousands of dollars in legal fees to try to preserve the property. If they’re unable to do that, the new owner — which purchased the property at the cost of a tax payment — turns around and sells the property at market value.

This practice takes place across the country, though some States and municipalities have established limits on fees and safeguards to protect the most vulnerable homeowners.

John Adams once said: “The moment the idea is admitted into society that property is not as sacred as the laws of God, and that there is not a force of law and public justice to protect it, anarchy and tyranny commence.”